Jon Bon Jovi has been praised by Nashville’s police department after the rock star helped to talk a distressed woman off the edge of a bridge.

The incident took place on the city’s Seigenthaler pedestrian bridge on Tuesday evening, which spans the Cumberland River. In surveillance footage, the woman is seen to have climbed over the bridge’s railing and is stood on a ledge on the other side. Bon Jovi is pictured calmly engaging in conversation with the woman, before he and a companion help the woman back over the railing. Later, Bon Jovi gives her a warm embrace and walks with her back across the bridge.

“It takes all of us to help keep each other safe,” police chief John Drake said in a statement shared on X.

Bon Jovi was widely praised on social media, with one user posting on his Instagram page: “From everyone who has struggled, thank you for stopping.”

The Bon Jovi founder and frontman, 62, released his 16th studio album with the group earlier this year, Forever, which reached the US and UK Top 5.

He has faced difficulties with his voice in recent years, with a damaged vocal cord preventing him from touring. “I’m more than capable of singing again. The bar is now: can I do two and a half hours a night, four nights a week? The answer is no,” he told the Guardian in June.

Bon Jovi is known for his social conscience: as a philanthropist he has helped those on low incomes, opening four outlets of his Soul Kitchen restaurant with a pay-what-you-can scheme, as well as funding housing and health initiatives.

• In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org